Viewing all items in Resource Category: Editorial

General Synod has asked for legislative proposals to allow lay officers found guilty of bullying to be disqualified from holding office. The motion was brought by the Ven Mark Ireland, Archdeacon of Blackburn. It wanted to address an imbalance of accountability in relationships, where lay volunteers currently face no significant consequences if found to have...

More than £250,000 was distributed by the Church of England last year to support conservation projects in parishes, including work to preserve wall paintings, baptismal fonts, stained glass windows and rood screens. A total of £255,585 has been awarded for 123 projects in 34 dioceses – with the number of grants up 20% on the...

Have you ever sat and watched the clouds drift by?  Some of them are vast, towering up and up into the sky. There can be clouds of discouragement and suffering in our lives as well, circumstances that temporarily blot out the sunlight of God’s love for us.  You may have such a cloud hanging over...

– fierce firebrand of the Early Church Tertullian was born in Carthage, North Africa, about 155 AD. He had pagan parents and his father may have been a centurion. Carthage was a prestigious Roman colony and Tertullian was given a good education in Greek, Latin, literature, history and philosophy. On arrival in Rome, Tertullian probably...

It was 200 years ago, on 19th April 1824, that Lord Byron died. One of the greatest British poets and a leading figure in the Romantic movement, he died of sepsis/fever while fighting for Greek independence from the Ottoman Empire. He was 36. Byron was born in London but brought up in Aberdeen and relished...

-the long-suffering servant girl of Lucca If you have ever been in trouble for simply doing good, then Zita is the saint for you.  Born in 1218 to poor but devout parents in Monsagrati, Zita was sent at the age of 12 to work as a servant for the rich Fatinelli family in nearby Lucca....

Here is something you didn’t expect: using hearing aids if you are a bit deaf can be of great benefit to your overall health. Crystal Rolfe, director of health at the Royal National Institute for Deaf People (RNID) said: “Hearing aids bring enormous benefits for people with hearing loss. Research shows that wearing hearing aids...

Emmaus Him and me Prayer for April 2024 The God who answers prayer JESUS The Hand of Christ The Rainbow Cat’s eyes ** Emmaus (Luke 24:13-32) In the breaking of the bread Our eyes were opened, We knew Him then. The Lord was with usIn Emmaus, There was no doubt. He was alive and with...

General Synod has affirmed the place of work as a key component in “human flourishing,” in an era when Artificial Intelligence is driving a “new fast moving industrial revolution”. The debate heard that work has been a vital “God-given” element of human life since the Garden of Eden. But it is currently being transformed by...

** Worry I have so many problems that if a new one comes along today, it will be at least two weeks before I can worry about it. **  Why Did the Chicken Cross the Road? (Theological Version) Billy Graham: The chicken was surrendering all. Rick Warren: The chicken was purpose driven. John Wesley: The...

Three hundred years ago, on 7th April 1724, the German composer Johann Sebastian Bach’s St John Passionwas performed for the first time, at a church in Leipzig. It was put on as part of Good Friday Vespers at St Nicholas Church, having been transferred from St Thomas at the last moment by the music council....

In the 1980s thanks to Godfrey Smith, a columnist for The Sunday Times, there was a series of letters about particular pieces of music that have the TQ – the Tingle Quotient. As we listen, the music sends a shiver of excitement up and down the spine and opens out for us a new world...